


Kind of a Useless Role

by scathachs



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: Brief mention of Shenko, Gen, Platonic Shega, Post-Mass Effect 2: Arrival, Pre-Mass Effect 3, Retrospective
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-16
Updated: 2015-12-16
Packaged: 2018-05-07 01:14:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,334
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5438039
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scathachs/pseuds/scathachs
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>James Vega guards the unguardable, and Shepard breaks out of house arrest to get ice cream.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Kind of a Useless Role

**Author's Note:**

> I finished my finals so I rewarded myself by finishing a fic that's been on my back-burner for a while. I genuinely love Vega's friendship so much. The Shepard used is a Colonist/Sole Survivor/Vanguard, though this is more for Vega than her.

James Vega remembers the last holo he saw of Shepard before she died: the Commander stood tall with her shoulders squared and gun drawn, her dyed red hair glowed in the light of the Citadel, the large scar across her face from Akuze lifted with her determined smile aimed right at the camera. Behind her was the crew she fought with and large blocked letters painted her a hero. And that's what she was: his hero, his respected goal, and his drive to stay loyal and strong to his cause against foul orders.

The soldier sitting alone and quiet within the confines of the Normandy's brig was someone entirely different. Instead of a shining hero-turned-traitor, he instead saw tired green eyes peek through short black bangs and angry red cracks where her facial scar used to be. Even her posture was different. This Shepard sat open-legged and hunched over like the world, her world, was weighting her shackled hands down. Before, she sat relaxed and practically dared someone to interrupt her good time. He wondered if it was a mistake, if he was assigned the wrong cell and the real Shepard was another block down.

Every second thought went away the moment she spoke.

“Well, aren't you cute.”

 

.o.0.o.

 

Ten days and five hours have passed since he started this job and Vega cannot be more bored. Shepard didn’t need a guard. She knew that, he knew that, Admiral Anderson knew that, the whole damn Normandy skeleton crew knew that, yet here he was guarding her all the same.

Commander Alia Shepard, the resurrected myth, the legend, the war criminal, only gives him dead-eyed stares and sleeps for most of the day. Shepard told him one night, after she woke up with tears in her eyes, that the silent screams of 300,000 Batarians is somehow worse than hearing a Reaper. When she doesn't dream of their enraged corpses invading Mindoir (again) and flaying her alive for sacrificing them for something as little as _time_ , she still manages to throw herself from her cot and call out for Major Alenko in a panicked state.

They agree not to speak about that, ever.

 

.o.0.o.

 

If he was being honest, Shepard’s face disturbed him. During the night cycle, the only thing he could see in her dimmed cell were the glowing red cracks on her cheeks and forehead. They'd move every time she gave him a polite smile or quirked a brow. When she read about the outraged Batarians demanding her blood for their massacre, he could have sworn they glowed.

James finally asked about them after around a month and a half on-duty, she only replied with a bored shrug and, “Stress.”

Eventually, the cracks healed over and she doesn’t glow in the dark anymore. When he caught her looking at herself in the mirror some time later, she seemed almost sad.

“They reminded me I was working. That I was doing something. Now I’m just biding my time while diplomats stall for time.” It was the longest stream of words she'd said to him in three and a half months, James could barely contain the speck of happiness in his gut. Progress is progress.

 

.o.0.o.

 

If there was one thing politicians were good at it's sensationalism. The moment they landed in Vancouver the media and Shepard's handlers made a public display of moving the “war criminal” and “murderer” to a more secure location to wait for trial. It's there Vega hears Shepard curse for the first time.

“Those fucking vultures.” He heard of her tragic run-ins with the media before, but seeing her raw hatred for the press and paparazzi was strangely refreshing.

 

.o.0.o.

 

Shepard's bored.

He’s watched her pace her room twenty five times and rearrange the furniture seven times, the bed wouldn’t move no matter how much of her biotic power threatened it. She took it as a challenge, James found it hilarious until she broke a window with a pillow and was shackled again while the repair crew fixed her mess.

Shepard was bored, and frankly, so was he.

 

.o.0.o.

 

They stood side-by-side in the building’s shooting range, Vega swore Shepard’s grin was going to break her face again.

She shot blanks into the test dummy in all the places that made him feel ghost pain for the poor bastard. He watched her, completely awestruck, as she moved from one dummy to another shooting bullets and biotics like this would be the last time she would ever hold a gun.

It’s the first time he hears her laugh. And, honestly, he’s a bit terrified.

 

.o.0.o.

 

The rotations in the night shift were precise down to the second. Shepard was only off camera when she used the bathroom, but even then she was carefully timed and monitored. If her silence was too long, the guard was obligated to knock on the door or break it down. The latter rule had earned a guard a black-eye, so they just stuck to polite knocking.

One minute she’s in her room, the next minute there’s a siren throwing him out of sleep and a scared-to-shit guard at his door rambling about how ‘Shepard was gone!’ and ‘the Admiral will kill us!’. The worst he got out of Admiral Anderson was an amused laugh and the firm order to find her before she floored another paparazzi.

It wasn’t hard to find her.

Or, to be precise, she didn’t _make_ it hard.

Again, she didn't need a guard. Shepard could crack a heavy-duty holo-lock in less than ten seconds, disabling her omnitool and removing her ankle bracelet was child's play in the scheme of things. She was five blocks away, she even sent a message saying to come alone and that she was unarmed.

There were a few things he expected to find when he arrived: a pile of dead bodies, a burning building, paparazzi, a pile of dead paparazzi in a burning building, etc. Finding Shepard sitting alone in a mom-and-pop ice cream parlor with mint chocolate chip dripping down her hand was maybe third on his list, seven tops.

She looked at him with a genuine, gentle smile when he rang the retro-style bell and stepped in, “dessert’s on me, Vega. Pick anything you want.”

James sat across from her with his double scoop of rocky road and cherry bomb deluxe. They ate in a strangely comfortable silence until Shepard popped the last bit of cone in her mouth and crunched hard.

“So, Commander.”

“So, Vega.” Shepard clicked her nails on the table and leaned into her other palm.

“Y’mind telling me why you broke out of containment to get ice cream?” The ‘we could’ve gotten it for you’ hung between them, but saying it would only make her angry.

“I had a craving for mint chocolate, plus I wanted to make sure I still liked it.” She shrugged like it was the answer he wanted. Vega laughed and finished off his treat not long after. Once done, Shepard held her hands out to him with her fists pointed down.

“Nah, not tonight, Commander. You’d get the cuffs sticky.” He grinned.

“True.” She paused just before the door to rummage through her pockets. Vega watched her throw a credit chit to the gentleman behind the counter and followed her out. He heard a loud gasp and a relieved cry of thanks as the door shut. Shepard smiled briefly and put her game-face back on while they walked back.

 

.o.0.o.

 

A week later, they played poker for fake credits and it gradually became part of their routine.

 

.o.0.o.

 

Two weeks after that, he's hauling ass back to the Normandy and praying to every god available that she didn't die the _one time_ she's off his watch.

Shepard doesn't need a guard, never did, but he'll be damned if he loses a hero-turned-friend to the shrieking robot tearing up the city


End file.
